Posts Tagged ‘behavior’

The large majority of people (80%) can best be described displaying a mixture of ‘extravert’ and ‘introvert’ behaviors. However, about 10% of people tend to show consistent ‘extravert’ behavior (and a likewise percentage show ‘introvert’ behavior). Can the tendency towards extraversion and introversion be recognized from the hands of an individual?

The picture above displays a ‘Hand Model for Extraversion’, which results from a multi-perspective hand study including 27 extraverts and 21 introverts (all Dutch citizens). The results e.g. point out:

“A discriminative analysis has pointed out that the ‘Hand Model for Extraversion’ can identify 85.4% of the subjects (41 out of 48) correctly as a HIGH of LOW scorer.”

Despite the fact that the hand lines (creases) have been on the scientific anvil during the past centrury, most people still associate these mysterious wrinkles with gypsies & the stigma of fortune-telling.

While the biological function of the hand lines is not understood well, various branches of academic science have adopted the hand lines as a scientific tool for exploring the genetic- & biological differences between various populations around the world… and the causes of disease!

ANTHROPOLOGY:

Many people assume that hand lines are only relevant to the ‘superstitious’ palmist. However, the truth is that antropologists have studied the anatomical aspects of the palmar- & plantar creases in both human- and primate populations. Paul Broca (1877) was the first to stir up interest among anthropologists in the so-called ‘simian crease’ by introducing the ethnic element in the study of creases. And even in 2nd decade of the 21th century few people appear to be aware of the racial differences in the perspective of the hand lines.

MEDICAL SCIENCE:

The medical significance of the hand lines became appearant after Langdon-Down (1909) described the significance of the ‘simian crease’ for Down syndrome. But his observation was valued with scepsis for quite a while, until the genetic cause of Down syndrome (trisomy 21) was recognized after the discovery of the Karyotype techniques in the 1950.

Later other hand line variations – such as the ‘Sydney line’ and the ‘hockey-stick crease’ – became as well associated with other syndromes, diseases & behavior characteristics – including criminal behavior, autism, schizophrenia, etc.

BOOKS:
The following book is solely devoted to the scientific study of the hand lines, including the consideration of various elements that can be described as ‘building stones’ in Mult-Perspective Palm Reading):

Bali writes in the final chapter ‘Creases – Their Scope and Goals’ (page 361):

“… Pronouncements on the association of creases with character and temperament are bound to remain questionable. But future researches on crease features, such as crease surface area, crease splits, crease length, and crease borders, may perhaps throw some light on the relationship. The crease surface area, in term of centimetre counts, cell counts and ridge counts, makes a sufficiently sensitive scale for marking change under differential, physiological, psychological or social stresses. This interesting area of investigation remains to be explored by future researchers.”

The relationship between hands & behavior had already been notice in the early days of the Greek philosopher Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC) – who e.g. debated the cause-and-effect relationship in the hand’s development and the emergence of the superior human intellect. Later the Roman physician Galen (129 – 199) became known for advocating the view that physical features could reflect inner characteristics of behavior. And more later the concept of the ‘physiognomy’ suggested that deviant behavior could be predicted from certain physical characteristics of the head and hands.

During the 2nd half of the 20th century a new development became manifest. The so-called ‘minor physical anomalies’ (MPA’s) became a study object for medical researchers in order to study the cause of various behavior related disorders – featured with a significant role for the most differentiated extremities of the human body: the hands & face.

The current state of research indicates that the etiology of these MPA’s is usually associated with two factors: 1 – genetics (sometimes they are described as congenital physical abnormalities), and 2 – insults to the fetal neural development towards the end of the first trimester (due to: infections, lack of oxygen, diseases in the mother & other prenatal traumas).

It became also appearant that MPA’s provide an important clue to specific malformation diagnosis, brain pathology and timing of pathology.

And especially the ‘Waldrop scale‘ (Waldrop & Halverson, 1971) became a popular tool to study the MPA’s in these populations. And various studies have indicated that the MPA’s included in the ‘Waldrop scale’ are much more often seen in certain groups of youngsters. While the average prevalence of items is usually low in controls (1.10-2,32), studies have reported much higher values in various populations, e.g.: Down syndrome (17.04%), schizophrenia (4.83%), Tourette syndrome (5.45%).

And the results typically show a much higher occurence of multiple MPA’s among the patients than in the control populations.

Hand markers in the Waldrop scale:

Interestingly, various items in the Waldrop scale relate to the hands, including: clinodactyly, nail hypoplasia, simian crease, single flexion crease on the 5th finger, Sydney line & unusual length of the fingers.

But the studies so far have also indicated that in the Waldrop scale individual items can not serve for reliable diagnosis. And few details are available regarding the possibility that specified combinations of MPA’s (within one body part or multiple body parts) could serve as a reliable diagnostic marker.

Other fascinating related reports have been made where hands become a significant specified marker when combined with other body markers. And these can even play a significant role in the explorations & identification of new syndromes.

The illustration below represents an example taken from a study where the missing of fingers (oligodactyly) combined with a disorder on the right eye lid, became a marker for a (new) syndrome that relates to chromosome 21qter (associated e.g. with congenital fibrosis of the extraocular muscles – Tukel CFEOM syndrome). Though there were no behavior problems reported for that syndrome, this example does show hand markers can be recognized as clues that relate to problems in the other extremities (in this example the eyes).